


i can hear your heart beat for a thousand miles

by jaradel



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Anxiety, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-13
Updated: 2016-03-13
Packaged: 2018-05-26 10:31:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6235129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaradel/pseuds/jaradel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bitty is injured in a game at Samwell while Jack is on a West Coast roadie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i can hear your heart beat for a thousand miles

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Characters belong to [Ngozi](http://ngoziu.tumblr.com), creator of the web comic [Check, Please!](http://omgcheckplease.tumblr.com)
> 
> Forever grateful to my beta, [mistyzeo](http://archiveofourown.org/users/mistyzeo), who helped me whip this into shape.
> 
> I used hovertext for the French in the story, but translations are also provided at the end. Any mistakes in the French are my own. 
> 
> Inspired by [this Tumblr post](http://jaradel.tumblr.com/post/140910556581/dont-think-about-what-would-happen-if-bitty-gets), which apparently struck a chord with a lot of you!
> 
> The title is a paraphrase of the first line of Van Morrison's "Crazy Love". Given Jack's love of "old people music" (or, as I call it, classic rock), I figured Jack would be a Van Morrison fan.

It happens while Jack is on a West Coast roadie.

The Falconers have just shut out the San Jose Sharks, and team morale is high on the bus back to the hotel. They don’t fly out until tomorrow morning, and Brett has already started organizing a postgame party in his room.

“Jack, you in?”

“Yeah, sure, I’ll stop by for a bit,” Jack says, pulling out his phone. The Wellies had a game tonight too, against Yale, but it ended sometime during the first period of his own game. It isn’t the first time this season that their game nights have overlapped, and ordinarily he checks his phone at the end of his game to see at least a dozen texts from Bitty. So it is curious, to say the least, when there are no new texts.

 _It’s probably nothing,_ he tells himself. _Maybe he’s too busy baking post-game pies._ But even before that thought makes it out of the mid-brain, Jack knows that isn’t the case. He wills himself to be calm, and composes a text that he hopes comes across as neutral, and not overbearing-boyfriend.

_We got a shutout! How was your game?_

Jack slips his phone back in his pocket. The bus pulls up in front of the hotel, and the Falconers file out, talking and laughing. Jack brings up the rear, and his relative silence – _Bitty still hasn’t responded_ – does not go unnoticed.

“Earth to Jack – hey, man, great game tonight, eh? Why the long face?” Brett asks, clapping a hand on Jack’s shoulder.

Jack looks up. “Oh – nothing. I’ll be by in a little while, yeah?”

“Sure, man. See you soon!” Brett says, catching up with the rest of the team. Jack walks slowly to the elevator, composing another text.

_Hey, you awake? I miss you._

Jack gets in the elevator alone. His phone loses signal, so he pockets it until he reaches the floor where the team is staying, the hotel wisely having booked all the players on the same floor to avoid annoying the other guests. The irony of being so attached to his phone is not lost on him; at Samwell, he barely looked at it during the day, but now it’s his primary link to Bitty, and when he’s not playing or practicing, it’s almost always in his hand.

The elevator doors swoosh open, and Jack goes to his room. He drops his bag by his bed and sits down. Cory has already been and gone, likely down the hall in Brett’s room by now. Jack pulls out his phone and dials Bitty. The phone rings several times before it’s answered.

“Hey, Jack,” a female voice answers.

“Lardo? What’s up – where’s Bitty?”

“Dude, I don’t know how to tell you this – fuck.”

Jack’s stomach turns over, and he mentally starts counting as the wave of anxiety builds from the base of his spine and creeps up his back. “Tell me what, Lards?”

“Bitty got checked, man. Hard. That asshole from Yale who checked him last year, Spencer. Slammed him into the boards right in front of our bench. Bitty didn’t even have the puck. It was blatant, man. The refs ejected him, but – oh God, Jack, it was worse than his frog year.”

Jack can hear Lardo fighting back tears, and he knows that she doesn’t cry easily. He clenches and unclenches his left hand, his left leg bouncing up and down spastically. “Wh-where is he now? Why did you answer his phone?”

“We’re back at the Haus now. He’s here in his room; he’s resting. I’m watching over him tonight. Another concussion – he blacked out, Jack. He went down like a sack of potatoes. And that asshole sprained Bitty’s wrist too. He said, ‘You don’t have Jack Zimmermann to protect you now, you little pussy!’”

Jack squeezes his eyes shut. The anxiety, now mixed with fear and worry, is a cold trickle through his limbs. He fights to keep his voice steady. “Thanks, Lardo. Thank you for taking care of him. I-I’m flying home in the morning. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Tell Bitty when he wakes up, will you? Just tell him – tell him I’ll see him soon, yeah?”

“Sure thing, dude. I’ll take care of him until you get here.”

“Thanks, Lards. Bye.”

“Bye.”

Jack ends the call. He slides off the bed onto the floor and folds in on himself, phone pressed to his chest, head between his knees. _Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. Bitty’s okay. He’ll be okay._ Jack’s traitorous brain starts replaying the check from his junior year, the first time Bitty had ever been checked, but the scene changes, and Jack hears Lardo’s retelling superimposed over it. He sees Bitty, unconscious on the ice, with that goon Spencer laughing over his crumpled form. Jack squeezes his eyes shut, willing the tears not to fall. _Bitty, mon amour, mon chéri, je serai là bientôt._

After several minutes, Jack forces himself to get up. He can’t let Cory find him like this; Cory won’t give him a hard time, but Jack doesn’t want to answer difficult questions. He sits down on the edge of the bed again, consciously breathing in and out as part of his calming exercises. Going to the party in Brett’s room is not an option. The last thing he needs is to pour alcohol over his flash-fire of anxiety, but the guys will be wondering where he is if he doesn’t say something soon. He decides to fire off a quick text to Cory.

_Got some bad news from home. Need to take care of a few things._

He plugs his phone into the charger and starts getting undressed. If he’s in bed and looks asleep when Cory finally gets back, maybe he can avoid an uncomfortable conversation. He hangs up his His phone buzzes, and Jack has a fleeting second of hope that it might be Bitty texting him, but it’s Cory.

_Sorry to hear that. Hope everything’s ok._

Jack crawls under the covers and curls up on his side, facing away from the door and thankful that he took the bed closer to the windows. In the protective cocoon of the bed, he lets go, quietly crying himself to sleep.

_X_

Jack wakes up the next morning to the chainsaw-like snoring of his roommate. He doesn’t even remember Cory coming in last night, and he figures that’s a good thing. Rolling over, he grabs his phone from the nightstand. Still no texts from Bitty, but there is one from Lardo.

_Bitty woke up around 7 and I told him you would be here later today. Text me when you get back._

Jack checks the time – it’s just after 6am in San Jose, so it’s 9am in Massachusetts. He puts the phone down and quietly goes about his morning routine, grateful that Cory’s still asleep and can’t see his puffy red eyes. He showers quickly and dresses in the same suit he wore yesterday. He doesn’t even bother to shave. Before he leaves the room, he walks over to Cory’s bed and nudges his shoulder.

“Hey man, time to go.”

“Wh-huh? What time is it?”

“Six thirty. Shuttle will be here at seven.”

“Yeah, okay, be down in a minute.”

Jack makes his way to the lobby, lost in thought. He runs into a few of his teammates, including Brett.

“Missed you last night, man. Everything alright?”

Jack forces a smile. “Yeah, just have some things to take care of at home. Sorry I didn’t make it.”

Brett, tactile in a way that reminds Jack of Shitty, pulls him into a one-armed hug. “’S okay, man. Do what you gotta do.”

Jack keeps his smile pasted on and pats Brett on the back in what he hopes is an acceptably friendly gesture, then gently disengages himself from the burly defenseman’s hug. He finds a quiet corner to sit down and wait for the airport shuttle, trying not to dwell on Bitty’s condition. He wishes he could be honest with his teammates, could tell them that his boyfriend was injured in a game and he needs to get home to him, but it’s not the right time. He’s had several discussions with George about when (not _if_ ; he made that clear when he signed) to come out, and George tells him the same thing every time: _we’ll talk about it at the end of the season_. Given how well the Falconers have been playing, though, that could be June, and Jack is getting tired of waiting. Tired of lying.

The airport shuttle pulls up on schedule. Jack takes a seat up front and starts doing the math. Their flight, a direct charter from San Jose to Providence, takes off at 9am. A five-hour flight time, plus the three hour time change, means they’ll land around 5pm. He allows another hour for getting out of the airport and up to Samwell. In roughly eight hours, he’ll be with Bitty. _Breathe._

_X_

The flight is blessedly uneventful, and Jack wills himself to be patient as the team disembarks the plane. He pulls out his phone and texts Lardo.

_Just landed. On my way._

Jack gets to his car and throws his bag in the passenger seat. Normally he’d go home and take a long, hot shower in his own bathroom to wash off the smell of stale airplane air, but not today. Jack is thankful that it’s Sunday and the next game is a home game on Tuesday, because he’s running on fumes at this point; adrenaline is the only thing keeping him awake. Fortunately Samwell is a straight shot up 95, and as long as he doesn’t get pulled over for speeding, he should be there a little after six.

He jumps out of the car and takes the porch steps in one bound. The door is unlocked, and he probably throws it open a little too forcefully to be polite, but he couldn’t care less at this point. Sitting on the disgusting green sofa are Chowder and two kids he doesn’t recognize. Lardo’s sitting in an armchair off to the side of the television and, when she sees Jack, points wordlessly up the stairs. Jack gives her a quick nod of gratitude and heads up to Bitty’s room. Standing in front of Bitty’s bedroom door, he forces himself to take a few deep breaths. _Calm down. Don’t let Bitty see you like this._ Carefully, quietly, he eases the door open, and steps inside, shutting it just as carefully behind him.

Bitty is asleep, curled up on his side. Jack moves closer, kneeling down beside the bed in front of his love. He sees an ugly purple bruise blooming on Bitty’s cheek, and a scrape along his jaw. Jack brushes Bitty’s cheek with his fingertips; Bitty’s been crying, and Jack’s heart is about to burst. _Mon Dieu,_ Bitty looks so small lying there. Jack brushes Bitty’s bangs off of his forehead and gives him the softest of kisses.

“Jack? Is that you?” Bitty’s voice sounds so small.

“Yes, _ mon chéri,_ I’m here. Don’t get up.” Jack stands, kicking off his shoes and shucking his suit jacket, leaving it crumpled on the floor. He crawls behind Bitty on the bed, curling himself around Bitty and wrapping his arms around him. Jack presses more gentle kisses to Bitty’s hair and face, anywhere he can reach.

“The last thing I remember was Spencer coming at me. I don’t remember leaving the ice. I woke up in the ambulance. They did a CT scan and said there was no swelling, so they sent me home. And then there’s this,” Bitty whispered, raising his braced wrist.

Jack closes his hand gently around Bitty’s wrist, guiding it back down to the bed. “And I have the worst headache. Thought I was going to be sick last night. Lardo stayed with me.” Bitty’s body shudders in Jack’s arms. “I just feel so bad, like I let the team down again,” he sobs.

Jack tightens his arms around Bitty. “Shhh, it’s okay. You didn’t let anyone down. Lardo told me what happened, she said Spencer went after you when you didn’t even have the puck. It was a dirty hit, it wasn’t your fault.”

Bitty takes a few deep breaths. “Yeah, but I keep wondering what I could’ve done differently. The coaches say I’m out for the rest of the season.” He turns in Jack’s arms and snuggles under his chin. “I’m so glad you’re here, Jack. You must be exhausted. How was your game?”

Jack laughs softly. Leave it to Bitty to worry about Jack, when Bitty is the one who’s injured. He presses a kiss to Bitty’s hair as the ache in his chest fades away. He’ll need to leave tomorrow morning, but for now he can have this: Bitty in his arms, listening intently as Jack recounts last night’s game. Before long, Jack can feel Bitty’s breathing become slow and regular, and he closes his eyes as his own exhaustion overtakes him.

**Author's Note:**

> Translations:
> 
> Bitty, mon amour, mon chéri, je serai là bientôt. = Bitty, my love, my dear one, I'll be there soon.
> 
> Mon Dieu = My God
> 
> mon chéri = my dear; my dear one


End file.
